


What I Did for Love

by LuthienLuinwe



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Nightwing (Comics), Red Hood and the Outlaws (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Car Accidents, Career-ending injuries, Grief, Guilt, M/M, Major Car Wreck, Major Depression, Prescription Drug Abuse, Recovery, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, Surgery, injuries, workplace harrassment
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-10
Updated: 2018-11-03
Packaged: 2019-05-20 17:46:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 15,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14899119
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LuthienLuinwe/pseuds/LuthienLuinwe
Summary: A major car-wreck leaves Dick with a career-ending injury. Luckily, Jason's there to pick up the pieces.





	1. What I Did for Love

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to my Discord buddies for helping talk me through this idea!
> 
> Everyone in this story is aged up about 5-6 years.

**“Look, my eyes are dry. The gift was ours to borrow. It’s as if we always knew. And I won’t forget what I did for love. What I did for love.”**

The sirens were blaring and the lights were blinding. What the hell had happened? Everything hurt. His head was fuzzy and he knew that couldn’t have meant anything good. He was crushed under twisted metal. God, there was so much blood… Whose was it?

Where was Damian?

Panic set in. He couldn’t breathe and he needed to know where Damian was. God, he never would have imagined this could have happened. If he could have, Dick never would have let Damian drive them in the first place.

He tried to move his head, but everything in his body was screaming at him not to move. He’d never felt pain like that in his life. “Keep him on his back,” he thought he heard someone say, but everything was so damn distant.

His head was heavy and his mind was fuzzy. God, he just wanted to sleep… “Stay with us, kid,” a second voice said, and Dick could have sworn he heard some pleading in that voice. 

“Get him on a backboard now,” the first voice demanded, and Dick couldn’t keep from crying out when they lifted him and set him back down. Something was around his neck. He was sure of that, but he couldn’t register what it was. 

Something plastic and cold was put around his nose and mouth. Normally he would have asked what it was, but it made his lungs burn less so it couldn’t have been that bad. “Driver barely got a scratch,” the second voice said.

Which driver? 

God he hoped it was Damian. He could never forgive himself if Damian got hurt or killed because Dick had decided to let him drive, even if he needed the practice so he could get his license… “Do we need to airlift?”

“No time.”

Airlift? That was bad. 

That was definitely bad.

“We need O-neg.”

“Room 9,” the sentences had stopped a long time ago. He was only catching bits and pieces of the information the paramedics were trading.

He didn’t even remember being loaded onto the ambulance.

* * *

Flashes of light.

Panicked voices.

“What the hell is going on?”

“I don’t care. I’m his father and I’m going to see him, dammit.”

“Is Grayson okay?”

Beeping. Beeping everywhere. God it was so loud. Couldn’t they mute the damned things? Something was sticking out of his wrist. Had he been kidnapped? No, a kidnapper wouldn’t have had lights that bright and beeps that loud…

_Can I drive?_

_Sure, why not._

It had been dark and raining. Damian was too inexperienced. Dick never should have agreed to let him drive… The car hadn’t had its headlights on. It had been in the wrong lane. Even with his reflexes, there was no way Damian would have been able to avoid the head-on collision…

“X-rays.”

“MRI.”

“Stay with us, kid.”

* * *

Shattered kneecap. Dislocated hip. Broken collarbone. Dislocated shoulder. One hell of a concussion. The concussion he could live with, but the others were… troubling. His doctor had tried to explain everything to him, but Dick’s head was too fuzzy from the painkillers to register much of what had been said.

“Hey kid,” he heard a tired voice say from the doorway and looked up to see Bruce standing there. He hadn’t even worn a suit. His hair was dishelved and he had dark circles under his eyes and Dick wondered how long he’d been out. “Can I sit down?”

Dick nodded and instantly regretted the motion when the rattling in his head and the ringing in his ears got worse. “Dami okay?” he asked, breathing a sigh of relief when Bruce nodded.

“He’s fine. Little banged up, but didn’t even have to go to the hospital.” Good. Dick could live with that, then. He must have taken the brunt of the collision. “How are you feeling?”

“Hurts,” he grumbled out and frowned when Bruce took his hand and squeezed it.

“We thought you were going to die.”

“Didn’t,” Dick shrugged and cried out when he pulled at his injured shoulder. “How bad’s it?”

“You need surgery on the knee,” Bruce sighed. “They’re probably going to have to replace it but they won’t know for sure until they get in there.” Dick nodded. Surgery was bad. But surgery also meant they could fix it. And if they could fix it he could get better and recover and go back to life as normal, at least given enough time to do so.

“So when do I get better?”

“Dick,” Bruce sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. In that moment, Dick couldn’t help but think his adoptive father looked much older than he was. Bad news. It had to be bad news that Bruce was trying to avoid telling him in order to spare his feelings.

But nothing could have prepared him for the words he heard.

“You don’t.”

* * *

He waited a week before the surgery and spent the entire damn time in the damn hospital. He had counted every last one of the ceiling tiles. There were four fluorescent lights. The curtain that wrapped around his bed had 50 flowers on it. At least his family had come to visit him every once in awhile.

Well, everyone except for Damian.

God he wished Damian would visit. He needed the boy to know that it wasn’t his fault. The other driver had been the one to decide to drive with an alcohol concentration equivalent of .23, not Damian. The other driver had been the one to swerve over and hit them dead on.

“Hey,” Jason swaggered into the room and dropped his jacket onto one of the chairs beside the bed. The hospital had grudgingly brought in three more after Bruce had insisted they allow more than two visitors at a time.

At least Tim was finally able to come visit. When Dick had been in the ICU, he’d had to wait outside. “Hey,” he sighed and carefully turned his head.

“Well you look like shit,” Jason turned the chair around so he was sitting on it backwards, arms draped over the back. Dick rolled his eyes. He wanted to make a snippy comment, to tell Jason to shut the fuck up. But it was rare enough for him to show up anywhere Bruce might have been, and Dick was going to take what he could get. “How are you feeling?”

“Drugged,” Dick answered and took a deep breath. He’d been pumped full of morphine and Dilauded ever since being brought into the hospital. He wondered if he’d ever be able to think straight again.

“Well, you kind of are,” Jason shrugged. “When do you go under?”

“Ten,” he answered and watched as Jason checked the clock, a bright red 9:53 glowing through a black background.

“Shit, sorry man,” Jason sighed and looked Dick in the eye. “You scared?”

“Hell no.”

“I would be.”

And for a moment, Dick thought he’d misheard. Jason wasn’t scared of anything or anyone. It was a routine surgery. For God’s sake, it was usually the elderly the surgery was performed on, not young men in the prime of their lives. But if something went wrong, his knee could be fucked up more than it already was. “I’ll be fine.”

“I know you will be,” Jason shrugged and waited with Dick until his surgeon came back.

He hissed when they started the Valium drip and gritted his teeth when they moved him onto a gurney. It took four professionals to move him from the gurney to the operating table. “All right, Mr. Grayson,” a man in a mask and gown said as he started a new IV line. “Count backwards from one-hundred for me.”

One hundred.

Ninety-nine.

Ninety-eight.

Nothing.

* * *

“Morning, sunshine,” Jason greeted him in the recovery room. Dick blinked several times to clear his vision. The last he remembered, there was only one Jason Todd, not two. “Good nap?”

Dick frowned and stared at his face. “You have white in your hair.”

Jason rolled his eyes and Dick could have sworn he heard the man laugh. “Yeah, been there for a few years now.”

“Like it,” Dick decided and groaned when he couldn’t move his leg. “Why stuck?”

“You just had major surgery,” Bruce reminded. Bruce was there? Bruce and Jay were never in the same room together. At least not without trying to kill each other. “Your leg’s immobilized for now.”

“Oh,” Dick nodded and frowned when he saw Jason’s face again. “You have white in your hair…”

* * *

It was another week before he was moved from Gotham Mercy to the Gotham Rehabilitation Center. God, he had to have been the youngest person there by several decades. He didn’t have a private room, and the man he was sharing it with had to have been in his seventies. “What are you in for?”

“Knee replacement,” Dick answered. He had wanted to scream when he’d been told the news. The damage was too extensive, the surgeon had said. There was no way they would have been able to get that many tiny pieces to fuse back together. 

He wished he could have forgotten the words he’d said next. _Mr. Grayson, I believe in being straight with my patients, do you understand me?_

_Yes, sir._

_Mr. Grayson, you’re never going to be completely healed._

His physical therapist was a young woman in her early thirties. Her name was Natalie and Dick was convinced she was a sadist who thoroughly enjoyed making the lives of her patients an absolute living hell.

But Dick had trained under the Batman himself. He could handle being pushed. He could handle being yelled at. And his doctor had to have been wrong because he was going to get better and he was going to run again. Because if he could run, he could go back to gymnastics and acrobatics.

He couldn’t live in a world without those things.

Being in the air was as necessary as breathing. It was life itself. It was the only connection he still had to his parents, and he knew, deep in his gut, that he could not survive in a world where he couldn’t do those things anymore.

And so he pushed.

And he pushed and he pushed.

And he lied and told Natalie that he was fine even when his knee was screaming in pain and his hip locked up. He lied and said he could go longer when he hit the ground again and again and again.

Mind over matter, Bruce had always taught him.

He was going to beat this.

He had to.

* * *

It was week three when Damian finally came to visit. He had hidden behind Bruce, face solemn and anxious in a way Dick hadn’t seen since Damian had come to live with them six years prior. “Hey Dami,” he smiled and glanced at Bruce.

A hesitation. Bruce glanced at Dick and back at Damian before nodding and stepping out of the room. “Grayson,” the sixteen-year-old greeted him. Dick noted that he hadn’t moved more than a few feet from the doorway. “I…”

“This wasn’t your fault,” Dick shook his head and held up his good hand before Damian could say anything. Damian started to open his mouth to argue, but Dick cut him off before he could. “You weren’t the drunk driver. You didn’t swerve into oncoming traffic. This isn’t on you.”

“It should have been me.”

“Don’t you dare say that,” Dick said, his tone sharper than he had intended. He wanted to cry when he saw Damian flinch away. Damian never flinched away. Not from him. “I’m fine, Dami. I’m going to be fine. Don’t ever, ever wish that this was you, okay?”

A silent moment hung between them, full of things neither of them were brave enough to say. “I ruined your life.”

“You didn’t,” Dick sighed. His life had been ruined. He knew that much. But he’d be damned if he was going to let Damian believe it was his fault.

* * *

He woke with a stabbing pain in his knee. No. That wasn’t good. He was supposed to be getting better. He was supposed to be getting stronger. He had tried to hide it, but Natalie, damn her, had caught on and sent him straight back to his doctor who’d taken more x-rays and yet another MRI.

He was over-exerting.

He’d caused more damage.

Permanent damage.

Weeks of physical therapy. He’d gone through weeks of physical therapy. And instead of getting better, he was just getting worse.

So then what was the fucking point?

* * *

“What do you want, Jay?” Dick asked without turning to face the other man. He’d been back at the manor for weeks. The rehab center had done all they could. Now it was just up to him to keep going to his appointments so he could maybe get back to some semblance of normality.

“You’re skipping PT,” he didn’t’ need to see Jay cross his arms to know he was doing it. Of course he was skipping PT. The last time he’d actually made a damn effort, he’d just messed himself up even more. He wasn’t going to get better so what was the point in even trying anymore? 

Slowly, he turned to face the second Robin. “He changed the codes in the Batcave, you know.”

He watched as Jason frowned, watched as realization sparked in his eyes. “You would keep pushing,” he sighed and sat next to Dick on the bed. 

“I can’t flip and I can’t fight crime and now I can’t even go to the God-damned Batcave, Jay,” his voice broke, and before he knew what was happening, Jason had an arm wrapped around him. He rested his head on Jason’s shoulder and tried to calm his shaking breaths and racing heart. “He didn’t have to take that away too.”

“Maybe if you start going back to your appointments and start getting better…”

“You don’t fucking get it, Jason!” Dick snapped and hated himself for losing his temper around Jason. “I don’t get to get better, okay? I don’t. I did everything right. I went to the appointments and I pushed myself and now I’m stuck like this so what is the fucking point in getting my hopes up just so they can come crashing down again?”

He hated the look he saw on Jason’s face, like he’d been slapped. But Jason still didn’t move away from him. He tensed when Jason pulled him into a tight hug, and for once he decided to stop acting like everything was okay.

He sobbed and he screamed and he didn’t care who heard


	2. Send in the Clowns

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning for suicidal thoughts.

**“Isn’t this rich? Are we a pair? Me here at last on the ground, you in mid-air? Send in the clowns.”**

He’d tried it when Alfred wasn’t looking. There was no other way he would have been able to attempt it, not when he could barely move on his own. Not when he was stuck in that damned wheelchair until he could get yet another damn surgery on his damn knee. He held his hand against the glass plate, and he hoped.

_Identity confirmed._

_Nightwing._

_Access denied._

He dropped his hand and he slammed the plate cover shut. It wasn’t fair. He could at least watch the comms. Oracle can handle it, Bruce had told him. He’d tried to argue that two sets of eyes were better than one. Why wouldn’t they be?

It would just upset him, Bruce had said. And maybe it would have, seeing everyone else doing what he had once loved while he was forced to stand by and do nothing. But it was worse knowing they were out there while he was stuck in bed. At least helping Oracle would make him feel like he was doing something.

“He’s only doing what he thinks is best, Master Richard,” Dick jerked his head around, instantly regretting the motion. Everything still ached. He wondered if it always would. When the hell had Alfred sneaked up on him? Sometimes Dick thought the butler knew everything. “You have a visitor. If you’re up for it, that is.”

Who the hell would have come to visit him? Jason would have just showed up. He didn’t want to talk to anyone. He wanted to go back to bed, to sleep and never wake up again. No… No, he couldn’t think like that. He could still get better. He could…

“Sure,” he sighed, hoping that a visitor might help. At least it would keep him away from the scary thoughts that kept popping into his head whenever he was alone.

He let Alfred help him onto the couch, let Alfred help him prop his leg up on the coffee table. It wasn’t fair, Tim had argued. Alfred never let him put his feet on the table. He wasn’t injured, Alfred had reminded. He didn’t need to keep anything elevated. 

Of all the people he expected to show up, Roy Harper hadn’t been one of them. “Hey,” the redhead greeted and sat across from him.

“Hey,” Dick smiled and leaned back against a throw pillow.

“Hey,” Roy grinned and tossed him a bag. Dick frowned and rummaged through it, rolling his eyes when he saw all the junk food and stupid B movies his friend had brought him. “Figured you’d be bored out of your mind by now.”

“You’re not wrong,” Dick replied. There was nothing on TV during the day when Tim and Damian were at school. And Damian had still been avoiding him like the plague whenever he was home.

“Well those movies won’t help. They’re fucking terrible. But I need you to watch them so I can talk to someone about how awful they are.”

“Well lucky for you, I suddenly have a ton of free time on my hands.”

Roy hadn’t mentioned the injury once.

And Dick had never been more grateful.

* * *

Screeching tires. Metal against metal. Blinding pain…

He woke with a start and jumped when he saw an arm wrapped around him. He’d definitely gone to bed alone. Or at least he thought he did. The pain meds did nothing good for his memory. “Sorry,” a familiar voice greeted him. He frowned and studied it. Strong jaw. Green eyes. White streak in his hair. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

“Why the hell are you in my bed?” Dick questioned, but he wasn’t angry. He hadn’t slept well since coming home from the rehab center. He wondered if he’d ever sleep well again.

“You were screaming in your sleep,” Jason shrugged. “B and the demon-brat couldn’t get you to calm down so they called me in. It’s a good thing I tolerate you.”

Dick nodded and curled up to him, shutting his eyes tightly. The wreck hadn’t even been that bad. It certainly wasn’t as bad as half the things they saw on a regular basis. So why was it bothering him so much? 

He felt a twinge of pain in his knee and he remembered.

“I was all kinds of messed up when I came back,” Jason commented and Dick opened his eyes to look up at him. Jason never talked about the time immediately after coming back. The only thing Dick knew was that he’d dug his way out of his own grave. “Even after the Pit. I’d forget to breathe sometimes. Like my body was trying to do what it was used to. Or I guess not do what it wasn’t used to. Really freaked Talia out.”

Dick shut his eyes again and tried to breathe Jason in, tried to stay in the moment. The present was safe and stable. It wasn’t full of past tragedies or future challenges. “I’m so sorry you had to go through that.”

“I could barely walk the first week,” Jason continued, as if he hadn’t heard Dick. Dick re-opened his eyes and frowned when he saw the spacey look in Jason’s. “Like I couldn’t remember how to. And I remember it felt so, so weird. Like I wasn’t supposed to, I don’t know… Like I wasn’t supposed to be.”

“Like you weren’t supposed to be what?” Dick frowned and watched as Jason sighed and stared up at the ceiling.

“Just like I wasn’t supposed to be. Period.”

“Hey Jason?” Dick asked and watched as Jason slowly turned to face him. “For what it’s worth, I’m glad you… Are, I guess.”

“Glad that I’m what?” Jason laughed, a soft, muted laugh, but still genuine. Dick couldn’t remember the last time he’d heard him laugh. He curled up into Jason’s side, resting his head on his chest. Everyone seemed to be avoiding him, like they didn’t want to touch him or say anything to him in case they made him worse. But not Jason. Jason always seemed to know exactly what to do.

“Just that you are.”

* * *

He watched as Damian pulled himself up onto the rings. He knew Damian was only doing it because he still felt bad about what had happened, but Dick didn’t care. He was just glad his little brother was willing to be around him again. But he could live without Damian constantly looking at him as if he were broken. Even if he was broken.

“Watch your grip,” he crossed his arms and wished he could stand up to correct him. But he was still stuck in that God-forsaken chair, and he knew he would be for another few weeks at the minimum. He needed another surgery, his doctor had said, and Dick had gone to get a second opinion.

His second doctor had disagreed. He didn’t need another surgery. He needed more than one. And even then he’d probably still walk with a limp for the rest of his life. And gymnastics? He could forget about that.

He watched Damian carefully pull himself into a handstand. He was moving too slow. He’d lose momentum and fall. “Don’t be scared of them,” he said. “They aren’t going to hurt you.”

“Tch,” Damian glared when he fell forward slightly. Dick was impressed he didn’t fall off the rings completely. “I am not afraid of some gymnastics equipment.”

“You have to trust yourself,” Dick sighed and watched as Damian carefully pulled himself back up. “You know you can do it. Stop trying to worry about getting it perfect. Don’t think. Just do.”

He doubted that was something Damian could ever do. He was too rational, too calculating. And there wasn’t anything wrong with that. It was just so different from everything Dick was used to. He watched as Damian sighed in frustration and dropped back to the ground, stumbling a little from the impact of the landing. They’d have to work on that if Damian decided he wanted to try again.

“Help me up,” he wheeled himself over to the rings. Maybe it would be better if Damian could see what he was talking about. He had to be careful with his leg, but he could do that. He could… But Damian was giving him a concerned look, one Dick rarely saw on his little brother’s face.

“I do not think that is a good idea,” Damian shook his head.

“I’ll just use my arms,” Dick promised, and he hated the brokenness that came through in his voice. He saw the hesitation mixed with pity, God he hated the pitying looks everyone kept giving him, in Damian’s eyes.

“Okay,” Damian sighed after a long moment. Dick leaned on him for support, more heavily than he would have liked to. And for a moment, just for a moment, he questioned if it was really a good idea for him to be doing something like that. It wasn’t fair to Damian to ask him to help. But Dick didn’t care. He needed something to feel normal again, even if it could just screw him up even more in the long run.

He carefully lifted himself onto the rings, even though his still healing collarbone was screaming at him to get back down and to stay down.

He heard himself hit the mat before he felt it. A hard thud that echoed through the room. He should have known better than to agitate the still-healing injuries. He stared up at Damian, who had immediately run over to him and shoved him away harder than he’d meant to when Damian tried to help him up. “I can do it myself.”

“Grayson…” Damian sighed and tried to reach for him again and Dick hated the crack he heard in that voice because he knew Damian was just blaming himself all over again even though Dick had been the one to decide to do things he wasn’t ready for.

“I said I can do it myself!” he snapped and watched as Damian backed away like a kicked puppy.

God, he just wanted to do one thing on his own. Why couldn’t anyone understand that?

He watched as Damian took a shaky breath and left. And he couldn’t even be bothered to feel bad about it.

* * *

If Dick never saw another hospital in his life, he thought he’d be the happiest person on the face of the planet. Damian had told Bruce about the little incident, and Bruce had demanded Dick get checked out, just to be safe. It wasn’t like he’d re-broken anything. He’d fallen on a padded surface for God’s sake. He hadn’t even hit it that hard.

“Sulk all you want,” Bruce said. They’d been in the waiting room for damn near an hour, and Dick wanted nothing more than to just go home. He wished Bruce would stop talking down to him. He wasn’t a child. “You’re still getting checked out.” Dick glared at him before focusing his gaze back at the receptionist desk. It wasn’t fair. None of it was fair. “When are you going to start taking this seriously, Dick? You need to take care of yourself.”

“Oh I need to take care of myself?” Dick snapped at him. “That’s great coming from you, you know that?” He was silent for a moment. His mind was going to that dark place again, but he didn’t care. Sometimes he thought it would be easier to just let his mind stay there. “I wish it would have killed me,” he spoke, voice barely above a whisper. And God, sometimes he wished it was true because then he wouldn’t have to be dealing with any of the shit he was dealing with. And saying the words scared him because the second they came out, the bad thoughts started up all over again. 

He wanted Bruce to yell at him, to glare at him, to do something other than just pinch the bridge of his nose and sigh deeply. He wasn’t some broken thing that they needed to tread carefully around. “I’m going to blame that on the head injury.”

Dick shook his head and crossed his arms, staring up at the ceiling. He wished he could wake up in his bed back in his apartment in Bludhaven. That this was all some horrible nightmare he was going to wake up from and never have to think of again. But he’d tried pinching himself to wake up too many times. And every damn time had ended the same. 

He was stuck in that hell. And he wasn’t getting out of it.

* * *

Jason had come to see him after the second knee surgery. “Wakey, wakey, Dickiebird.” God, why did his voice have to be so damn loud? He’d been moved to his room from recovery, but the anesthetic was still making his head fuzzy. “Brought you something.”

Dick frowned when Jason threw a brown paper bag onto his lap. He hadn’t eaten anything since midnight the night before, and his surgery hadn’t been scheduled until one in the afternoon. The pain meds may have upset his stomach, but God he was hungry. He glanced into the bag and grinned when he saw the food inside. It may have been terrible for him, but it beat whatever the hospital had been trying to force him to eat. “I fucking love you.”

“Figured you’d be sick of all the hospital food by now,” Jason sat in the chair by the bed and propped his feet up across Dick’s torso. Dick rolled his eyes but didn’t say anything. The contact was nice, even if it was minimal. “Had to bribe a nurse to let me smuggle it in. You can pay me back later.”

“You know, I think I might actually be sick if I have to eat another Jello cup,” he commented as he started in on the fries Jason had brought him.

“Fuck Jello,” Jason laughed and leaned back in his chair before chatting with Dick about the latest Outlaws adventures. He loved that about Jason. Loved that he didn’t try to be careful about upsetting him by talking about the things Dick couldn’t do anymore. He stayed with Dick until the nurses kicked him out. “Get some sleep,” he said. “God knows you need it.”

He watched Jason leave and he shut his eyes. And for a moment, just for a moment, he let himself believe that everything could go back to normal.


	3. You Gotta Die Sometime

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning for suicidal thoughts, harassment, and prescription drug abuse.

**“I would cry if I could, but it does no damn good to explain I’m a man in my prime. You gotta die sometime.”**

Dick stared at the little orange bottle in front of him. _Grayson, Richard J. Lortab 10-350. Take every four hours as needed to relieve pain_. He shook a pill into his hand and swallowed it dry. His surgeon wanted to start weaning him off of them, but every time he tried the pain in is knee came back ten-fold.

God it would be so easy to just take too many and fall asleep…

He jumped when he heard a knock on his bedroom door, well, technically Alfred’s bedroom door, he’d been moved there since it was on the first floor, and left the adjoining bathroom to answer it, sighing when he saw Jason on the other side. “What are you doing here?” he asked with a frown. Jason only ever visited later in the day.

“Taking you to PT,” Jason answered, and Dick fought the urge to groan. Couldn’t they let him skip it for a damned day? It wasn’t like he was doing anything. The only saving grace was he’d been in the heated pool, and the warm water felt good on his joints. “You gonna get dressed?”

Dick frowned and glanced down to see what he was wearing: old sweat-pants and a Wayne Enterprises t-shirt he never remembered getting, probably came from some charity event. “Yeah, hold on,” he answered before going through his drawers, not bothering to close his door. It wasn’t like Jason had never seen him half-naked before.

He pulled on a Bludhaven PD shirt and a fresh pair of sweats, groaning when the motion agitated his hip and knee. At least his collarbone was healing like it was supposed to. One less broken thing to worry about. He pulled his right shoe on, and sighed in frustration when he couldn’t get the left one. Weeks of PT and he still couldn’t bend his knee right.

“Need some help?” Jason asked, already approaching him. Dick shot him a glare, and it must have been a damned good one because Jason immediately backed off. “You know, it’s okay to need help.” He thought about making a snide comment. After all, Jason had always thrown Bruce’s attempts to help him to the side, pushed them away like they meant less than nothing to him. But it wouldn’t do any good. His heart was in the right place.

“Okay,” he sighed and reluctantly handed the shoe over to Jason, watching as the younger man slid it on and tied it. Dick leaned against him for support. “Thanks, Jason,” he sighed and didn’t even try to protest when Jason got him back into his chair and started toward the car.

He leaned against Jason once more and carefully got into the passenger seat, buckling his seatbelt in one swift motion. He leaned against the car door and watched the road fly by beside them. Hell, maybe if he got lucky another car would hit them.

And maybe, if he were lucky, that one would finish the job.

* * *

It was six weeks in when he was finally cleared to go back to the station, but things had gone south faster than he had ever thought they would. There were no “welcome back’s,” no “glad to see you up and about again”s. And why would there be? He was useless to his teammates when he couldn’t walk without assistance, when he was confined to that damned chair for at least another three weeks.

Light duty. God, he hated those words. He was a cop, not a file clerk. And there were only a handful of things he could think of that were worse than sitting and doing paperwork all day while Sergeant Adams breathed down his neck.

“Did they say when you’d get full mobility back?” Commissioner Towns had asked him in passing.

“Probably a few months,” he lied easily. Never. Because if he admitted to it, he knew he would lose his job. At least this was buying him a few more months, even if it was a few months spent chained to a desk, staring at a computer. Maybe if he got lucky they’d let him cover dispatch for a few hours a day.

But when had he ever been lucky?

“You still have a few weeks of FMLA,” Towns had commented. “Surprised you aren’t taking it.”

“Going to die of boredom if I’m away much longer, sir,” he’d answered, eyes never leaving the screen in front of him. It wasn’t exactly a lie, but it wasn’t the truth either. He hadn’t had a chance to get bored, not when his days were filled with constant appointments and follow-ups and old friends popping in to ‘see if he was okay.’

At least working his normal six-to-two gave him some sort of normalcy. At least he could feel like he was making some sort of difference, unlike when he was holed up in his room, stuck in bed, or sitting in the living room watching the stupid movies Roy had brought him (God he was right, they were the worst things Dick had seen in his life).

And he couldn’t help but smile when he headed toward the break room for lunch, only to see a ‘Welcome Back,’ cake and a ‘Get Well Soon,’ card signed by everyone on his shift. He wouldn’t trade anything in the world for his co-workers.

And that made lying to them infinitely harder.

* * *

He glared at Bruce when his adoptive father pulled into a parking lot behind an older Victorian neighborhood in the upper-middle-class part of town. Healing Hands Counseling Alternatives. “I don’t need to see a damn psychiatrist,” he growled, but Bruce just sighed and got out of the car.

The last damn thing he needed was to sit in front of some stranger and talk about his feelings just to be told to take another damned pill so he could try and feel normal again. And therapy? Bruce could forget about that. He wasn’t doing it.

Still, he didn’t have much choice in the matter. He couldn’t drive while he was still on the pain pills, and Bruce could drag him in kicking and screaming if he needed to. And Dick didn’t plan on losing what was left of his dignity any time soon.

Clinical depression.

What did she know anyway?

He should have lied. He should have lied through his teeth and said that everything was fine and that he’d never felt better in his life. But she wouldn’t believe him. Or at least he doubted she would.

And she’d sent him home with a shiny new prescription for some shiny new pills and a recommendation to start seeing a counselor. And Dick had hid the prescription pad paper it in his pocket and told Bruce he was fine and good to go back to life as normal.

And not even the infamous Batglare would get him to cave on that.

* * *

“Are you still on these?” Jason frowned and Dick mentally berated himself for leaving his pills on the counter in the bathroom instead of in the medicine cabinet where they belonged. And he hated that Jason’s voice held more surprise than it did worry because he’d been on them for weeks, and God he really needed to start coming down.

Dick was silent for a long moment. He took a deep breath and lay back against his pillows, staring up at the ceiling. “Can I ask you something?” he asked, but didn’t wait for Jason to reply. He felt the mattress sink lower and didn’t have to turn to see Jay sat beside him. That seemed like a good enough go-ahead for him. “Do you ever, I dunno…” he shut his eyes.

“Do I ever still what?” Jason pressed and Dick opened his eyes and turned to see him sat cross-legged next to him, eyebrows furrowed and mouth slightly open.

“You ever still feel like you’re dying?”

He heard Jason’s breath catch, and he wished he could have taken the question back. He’d crossed a line. He’d crossed a line and Jason was never going to talk to him again… “Why do you ask?”

“Cause sometimes I still feel like I’m being crushed,” Dick answered, the words coming before he could stop them because Jason was safe and Jason would keep his mouth shut about anything Dick told him. “And I can still hear screaming and I don’t know who it is. And I can still hear everything pop out of place and I can still hear it snap…”

Jason sighed and shut his eyes and a long silence fell between them. “I took a crowbar to the head, Dick,” he spoke as he exhaled. “You don’t really forget how that feels. And honestly, I think I might have been dead before the building blew.” Dick nodded and curled up to Jason’s side, shutting his eyes when he felt Jason’s arm drape around his shoulders. “Honestly I’m surprised I’m not permanently brain damaged.”

“Yeah, well I’d kill to get into a Lazarus pit right now,” Dick commented, and frowned when Jason immediately tensed and pulled away.

“Don’t ever fucking say that,” he shook his head, more of a violent jerk than a controlled movement. “You really don’t understand how much that fucks with you, okay? It’s not worth it. I know you hurt, and I know you’re depressed as fuck right now, but the pit madness isn’t fucking worth it, okay?”

“Okay,” Dick sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “Not like I was serious about it, anyway.”

* * *

Days were bad. But nights? Nights were a special hell all on their own. At least during the day he could be distracted. Nighttime brought nothing but thoughts of everything he could have been doing, about everything he should have been doing. He should have been in Bludhaven, not Gotham. He should have been in Kevlar, not cotton.

He should have been doing anything other than lying in bed trying to get some sleep even though his mind wouldn’t shut up and his body wouldn’t stop aching and he couldn’t stop hearing the screeching sound of metal on metal…

Dick woke with a groan when he felt something small and warm curled up against his back. He carefully rolled over, regretting it when he heard a disgruntled noise and a loud ‘meow.’ “Hey, Alfred,” he sighed and scratched the cat behind its ears. “You’re in the wrong room, buddy. Damian’s upstairs.”

It took him a second to catch the mistake. Damian wasn’t upstairs. Damian was out God-knows-where doing God-knows-what doing his duties as Robin. And Dick should have been out, should have been in his uniform tracking down the latest Bludhaven baddy. God, he’d been so damned close to busting a major drug trafficking ring. Now he doubted they’d ever get caught. It wasn’t like the police force would do anything about it.

The cat meowed and curled back up, this time on his chest, and Dick took in a sharp breath when he agitated a few of his still-bruised ribs. “Really?” he questioned, but the cat just stared at him and blinked.

He shut his eyes and listened to the cat purr, letting the sound lull him back into sleep.

* * *

“Aw, daddy still have to drop you off at work?” Reynolds smirked, and God, Dick wanted nothing more than to punch him square in the mouth. Maybe he’d even knock a few teeth out. He could hit hard enough to do it… “Cute.”

“Fuck off,” Dick snapped and started to wheel his way over to his desk, the one he hated more and more every passing minute, only for Reynolds to block his path. “Seriously?” he demanded and crossed his arms.

“My work load’s twice as high thanks to you,” Reynolds commented, and Dick froze when the man grabbed him by his shirt collar, pulling him up out of his chair. He should have tried to fight. He should have said something. He should have…

But his bad shoulder hit the hard linoleum floor before he knew what was happening, and his head was ringing and he heard Sergeant Adam’s muffled, “Reynolds, my office now!” but he knew it shouldn’t have been muffled and he could see feet rushing toward him and could hear questions he couldn’t remember how to respond to because the sharp, shooting pain his shoulder was damn near blinding him…

The world was slowly swimming back into focus, his double-vision clearing with each blink. “You okay?” Diaz, his former partner, asked and knelt down beside him. He started to nod, but it just made the ringing in his ears start up all over again. “Fuck Reynolds, man,” he commented.

“Yeah, fuck him,” Dick muttered and didn’t fight it when Diaz helped him into a sitting position. “Who fucking does that?”

“Apparently him,” Diaz sighed. “You need to go to the hospital or something? Looked like you hit your head pretty hard.”

“I’m fine,” Dick answered, hoping to God that he really was fine. He made a mental note to lie about his day at work. The last thing he needed was to give Bruce another reason to worry about him. He’d dealt with bullies all his life. What was one more at work?

“You sure you’re okay?” Reynolds pressed and Dick shifted his weight toward his former partner as he assisted Dick back into his chair.

“I’m fine,” he repeated and shut his eyes, hating himself for how easily he could tell that lie.

He reached into his pocket.

He popped a pain pill.

And he got back to work, acting like nothing had happened.


	4. Pretty Funny

**“Shut the light off. Turn the bed down. No more crying. Don’t you dare. You’ll wake up some time tomorrow and forget to even care.”**

Take the pills. Go to PT. Doctors appointment. PT. Pills. Doctor’s appointment… Sometimes Dick thought it was never going to end. He sent Jason a text after his latest appointment with his orthopedist. _‘Heading home. Bad news. Save me from B?’_

The reply came almost immediately, something that Dick couldn’t help but smile about. _‘Already there.’_

The ride home had been tense. Alfred had tried to make small talk, but for once in his life, Dick didn’t feel like talking to anyone about anything. Well, anyone except for Jason. The others didn’t get it. They never would. He was broken, and he’d never be fixed, and no one knew what that felt like quite like Jason Todd did.

“Hey Alfred,” Dick frowned when he saw Jason sitting outside, leaned against a no-doubt stolen vehicle. He must have gotten into it with Bruce again if he hadn’t gone inside. “I’m kidnapping our patient for the rest of the day.”

“Very good, Master Jason,” Alfred smiled. Dick leaned against him, letting the older man help him out of the one car and into the other. Jason popped the trunk, and Dick watched as he carefully placed his walker in it. He hated that thing. He hated that damned thing with every fiber in his being. But at least it was a little bit better than the chair had been.

“So what’s up?” Jason asked as he slid into the driver’s seat and shut the door. God, Dick wanted to get behind that wheel. But driving would still be a few weeks away. Doctor didn’t want him operating heavy machinery on his pain meds. _We’d really, really like for you to stop taking them, Mr. Grayson._. Like he was going to any time soon. Not when everything still hurt every minute of every God-damned day.

“Just sick of everything,” Dick sighed and stared out the window, watching the wooded area by the manor pass by. He used to play in those trees, right after his parents had died. He would have killed to get in them again. No improvement. Jason nodded, but didn’t reply, and Dick shut his eyes, taking a deep breath before opening them again. “I fucking hate all of this.”

“I know,” Jason sighed, and Dick jumped when Jason squeezed his hand. “Shit, sorry, I…”

“No, it’s fine,” Dick assured. The touch had been nice. Just unexpected. Especially coming from Jason. “I think I needed that. Everyone else is too scared to look at me, let alone touch me. I’m not some glass doll that’s gonna break if handled wrong.”

“Damian still not driving?” Jason asked, and Dick shook his head. Bruce had tried to convince him to get more practice in, but Damian could barely even ride in a car, let alone get behind the wheel of one. Not since the accident, at least. “I get it,” Jason sighed and refocused his gaze on the road ahead. “I still won’t go anywhere near a damned hardware store.”

“You fighting with B again?” Dick asked, changing the subject. He didn’t need to hear the answer when he saw Jason’s jaw set, when his grip tightened on the wheel. “Sorry,” he sighed. “Sore subject.”

“Yeah,” Jason muttered. “It’s stupid. I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Okay,” Dick sighed, reluctant to let the subject drop. “So the Knights lost again…”

* * *

They’d gone to see some stupid action movie. Dick didn’t remember anything about the plot. He was pretty sure there was an explosion. Maybe two. Bruce wouldn’t have wanted him to go. It would just upset him, he’d say. God, why couldn’t Bruce get it into his damned head that Dick liked seeing people enjoy the things he’d once been able to do. Just because he couldn’t enjoy them anymore didn’t mean no one else could either.

“I can’t believe I paid fourteen dollars for that shit,” Jason shook his head, but Dick could see a ghost of a smile on his face. He didn’t think he’d ever seen Jason smile, at least not since he’d come back. Smirks? Yes. Glares? Definitely. But never a full smile.

“It wasn’t that bad,” Dick rolled his eyes. He tried to ignore the kids staring at him. Why wouldn’t they? Men in their mid-twenties didn’t use walkers. Or it wasn’t the standard at least.

He let Jason help him into the car, and frowned when he started to turn left out of the parking lot. Headed the long way home. Down a winding road that a drunk idiot had decided to drive down… “What’s wrong?” Jason frowned.

“Can you go the other way?” Dick asked, hoping to God Jason didn’t press because he couldn’t ruin the illusion that everything was fine and that he was fine and that he was over it.

“Okay?” Jason frowned and turned right, and Dick let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “Thought you’d want more time away from B?”

“That’s the road,” Dick muttered and leaned against the car door. He watched Jason nod before staring out the window again, glad that Jason wasn’t going to press him to talk about it.

“You know,” Jason commented, and Dick glanced at him from the corner of his eye. “If someone ever suggests I go to Ethiopia with them, I just may punch them in the face.” And Dick smiled and rolled his eyes because only Jason would make that kind of comment to try and lighten the situation. Because Jason didn’t care about what other people thought, and he didn’t care about what other people cared about.

And Dick wouldn’t have traded that for the world.

* * *

His heart was pounding in his chest and he felt sick to his stomach. He stood outside his shift sergeant’s door, trying to psych up enough to go in. He took a deep breath and knocked on the side of the doorway. “Hey, got a minute?”

“Of course,” the man nodded and motioned for Dick to enter. Dick maneuvered his walker through the door and shut the door behind him before sitting in the cold, plastic chair across from his boss’s desk. “What’s up? How’s the knee?”

“I actually wanted to talk to you about that,” Dick took a shaky breath. “It, uh… It’s not going to heal all the way.” He watched as his supervisor took a deep breath and pinched the bridge of his nose. “I thought it might heal enough for me to do my job, but my doctor doesn’t think so. I’d be happy to do desk work or…” He stopped when the man held up a hand to silence him.

“Look, Grayson,” he sighed and folded his hands on top of his desk. Great. Any time a boss started with the word ‘look,’ it never ended well. “We’re pretty well staffed in dispatch and at reception. We need beat cops. And you can’t be a beat cop without full mobility.” Dick nodded, but kept quiet. He tried to ignore the sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, the feeling that the one sort-of normal thing in his life was going to be forcibly taken from him. Just like everything else had been. “I don’t want this to ruin you, okay?” Dick nodded and tried to focus on the floor. There was a roach in the corner near the sergeant’s bookshelf. God, they really needed to get the building sprayed. “So I’m going to let you resign.”

“Okay,” Dick sighed and nodded. At least that wouldn’t kill any chances he’d have at a future job. Still, the words felt like acid in his mouth, and he wanted nothing less than to have to say them out loud. “I resign.”

* * *

“Follow your hands back,” Dick instructed and crossed his arms over his chest. God, it would be so much easier to show Damian how to do it. But he wouldn’t be bending over backwards for a good, long while. If he could ever even do it again. Hell, he’d even be a better help if he could bend over right to help Damian.

“I’m trying,” Damian glared, and Dick made a mental note to watch his tone. Damian hated learning to tumble, and Dick knew it. But between school and patrols as Robin, Dick barely got to see his little brother. At least this was something. He watched as Damian held his hands up and followed them back, still only getting halfway over.

“Try against the wall. More support,” Dick offered. “I saw that,” he added when Damian rolled his eyes at him.

“Why do I need to learn these things?” the teen asked, crossing his arms. God, when had he become such a damn teenager? 

“Looks badass,” Dick answered. “Not to mention confuses the bad guys. Doesn’t hurt with women either.”

“Tch,” Damian responded but braced his hands against the wall anyway, walking them down until he was in a full backbend. “Humans are not meant to bend in this fashion.”

“Some of us are,” Dick shrugged. Were, he corrected himself mentally. It wasn’t like he hadn’t expected to lose it. Acrobats never stayed limber forever. But he had still thought he’d get a few more years, maybe even a decade in. His father was still on the trapeze in his early thirties, after all. 

“How do I even get out of this?” Damian asked, and Dick smiled slightly. He could tell him. But what would that teach him? He watched as Damian tried to stand, but eventually gave up and dropped to the ground.

“You don’t have to do this, Dami,” Dick sighed and pulled his good knee to his chest. He watched as Damian caught his breath before carefully sitting up. “I know you hate it.”

“It is fine,” Damian argued, shooting Dick a glare that would have put Bruce to shame. “I am late for patrol,” he added before brushing off and leaving. Dick watched the door shut behind him. 

At least it was better than being ignored.

* * *

Sometimes, if he closed his eyes, he could forget. Sometimes, if he closed his eyes, he was flying through the air, weightless, free. Like a little robin, his mother had told him. His father had never seen someone who was so comfortable with their feet off the ground.

Sometimes, if he closed his eyes, he could see the Bludhaven rooftops. He could feel himself lost in free-fall until he launched his grapple just in time. 

And every damn time he opened his eyes, he was forced to remember. He was broken. He couldn’t do anything. He’d never be able to do the things he loved again. “Come on, kid,” his new physical therapist spoke, snapping Dick out of his trance. “One more time.”

Dick sighed deeply and focused on the motion. He just needed to keep himself up for a few steps. Toddlers could do it, for Christ’s sake.

But all he did was fall. And fall. And fall again. One more time. Yeah fucking right. It was never just one more time. He just wanted to go home and sleep. It was good for him to get out of the house, Bruce had said. What did Bruce know anyway? At least in bed nothing could hurt him again.

The remainder of the hour dragged on at an agonizing pace. Plateauing, he heard his physical therapist say in the hall, when he thought Dick couldn’t hear him. All those lies his teachers told him in school that if he tried hard enough, if he worked hard enough, he could do anything he wanted…

They were liars. Every last one of them.

“How did it go?” Bruce asked as he helped Dick back into the car. And Dick just shook his head. Why bother telling him? Bruce would just say they were wrong, they didn’t know what they were talking about. And the last thing Dick needed was to get the world’s sorriest pep-talk from Bruce fucking Wayne.

He was just as bad as the rest of them.


	5. No More

**“No more questions. Please. No more tests. Comes the day you say, ‘what for?’. Please. Just. No more.”**

Dick sat with his head in Jason’s lap, Jason playing with his hair. Another bad dream. Metal screeching against metal. Harsh sirens. Bright, flashing lights.  _ Stay with us, kid.  _ If he listened close enough, he could hear Jason’s heart beating in his chest. He shut his eyes and tried to focus on his own breathing, air coming into his mouth, traveling down into his lungs, and back out again. If he thought about it, he could hear his pulse against Jason’s leg. Swish. Swish. Swish. Slow and steady. “Sorry,” Dick sighed. It wasn’t fair that Jason had to keep coming to the manor, especially not when things were still tense between him and Bruce.

“Don’t be,” Jason sighed. Dick opened his eyes and glanced up at Jason. Dark circles under his eyes. Nasty gash on his forehead. Had he been out on patrol that night? No. Dick didn’t want to think about that. “It’s fine,” Jason sighed, as if he had read Dick’s mind. Sometimes Dick wondered if Jason actually  _ could  _ do that. 

“Rough night?” Dick asked and moved so he was sat cross-legged and facing Jason. Sometimes it was easy to forget that other people had problems too. He made a mental note to try and work on that. Hell, Damian had been visibly upset when he’d gotten home from school the day before… And Dick hadn’t done a damned thing about it. He watched Jason nod and run a hand through his hair, causing it to stick up at gravity-defying angles. “Want to talk about it?”

“Just some stupid shit,” Jason sighed and leaned against Dick’s headboard, one leg extended, one bent close up to him. For a moment, it was like they were kids again, staying up late at night and hoping that Bruce or Alfred didn’t catch them, talking about whatever weird things had been happening in their lives. God, so much had changed after Jason had died. “It’s not important.”

“Okay,” Dick sighed and reluctantly let the subject drop. It wasn’t like pressing the issue would do any good. If it did anything, it would just piss Jason off and cause him to drop off the face of the planet for God-only-knew how long. His relationship with Bruce and the others was still shaky at best. But at least with the current arrangement, Dick knew he wasn’t dead in a ditch somewhere, never to be seen or heard from again.

No, he didn’t want to think about what would happen if Jason were to die again. He couldn’t handle that, even without everything else going on. “Try and go back to sleep, okay?” Jason asked, and Dick nodded, curling up to Jason’s side. 

He shut his eyes and listened to Jason’s breathing. Inhale. Hitch. Exhale, and let the rhythm of it lull him back into sleep. He kept anticipating more screeching. More screaming. More sirens and more lights. 

But they never came.

* * *

He sat at the island, pushing his spoon around in his bowl of cereal, listening to Bruce lecture him about the importance of continuing to go to his appointments. God, did he think Dick was an idiot? He knew he had to keep going, even if they weren’t doing a damned thing to help him. Even though all they did was make him more irritable than usual and made everything hurt ten times more than it already did. “You know, it would help if I could get back into the cave,” he commented, a rare moment of bravery striking in him.

He watched Bruce sigh and set his fork down next to his bowl of fruit. “Dick, we decided…” he started to say, and Dick shook his head.

“No, we didn’t decide,” he reminded, voice taking on more of an acidity than he had ever thought possible. “You decided. And you didn’t even tell me.” 

“It was for your own good.”

“I  _ needed  _ that, Bruce! God. I still need it.”

He sighed when he heard footsteps coming toward the archway. God, the last thing he needed was to make Damian feel like he had to take a side in any of this.  _ I would win.  _

“What is going on?” Damian asked, and Dick watched as he crossed the kitchen and poured a glass of orange juice.

“Nothing,” Bruce answered, tone curt, suggesting Damian shouldn’t even dare to ask more questions about it.

“You know what?” Dick asked, and used the counter for balance to help stand up. “I’m really not that hungry.” Bruce had started to say something, but Dick shot him a glare that must have been intense enough to shoot whatever words he’d been planning dead in their tracks. 

“Grayson,” Damian sighed, voice resigned in a way that shouldn’t have been possible for a boy that was barely sixteen. But had any of them ever really been boys? Dick wasn’t entirely sure. 

He should have apologized. He should have said something to try and reassure Damian that everything was fine. But his blood was boiling in his veins, and it was taking everything in his power to keep himself from lashing out at Bruce. “You’re late for school, Dami.”

He headed back to his bedroom. Seemed like he spent all his time in there lately. What else was there to do? He couldn’t work, at least not in the job he’d fallen in love with. He couldn’t work out, not when the risk for even more damage still loomed over his head. 

He pulled his nightstand drawer open and reached for the little orange bottle inside. It was light. He knew it was getting lighter than it was supposed to be, at least that soon. He pressed and twisted the little white cap, and he felt his heart sink when he saw the nothingness inside.

Cell phone in one hand. Prescription bottle in the other.  _ Please enter your prescription refill number.  _ It was easy. Six digits. He’d done it four times already.  _ Sorry. You have zero refills remaining.  _ It was bullshit, he thought as he threw his phone onto his bed. He was only a month out from the latest surgery. Everything still hurt.

And the meds made him sick to his stomach, but at least they made him sleep. God, sleeping was bad enough with them. He didn’t want to start to think about sleeping without them. He took a shaky breath and picked his phone up again, calling his doctor’s office. He just needed one more refill. That was it. It wasn’t too much to ask for.

But the doctor had declined it. He’d already pushed the limit by authorizing the last refill. It was supposed to have lasted him two months and it had barely lasted three weeks.

What the hell did doctors know anyway?

First they’d told him he’d never do the things he loved ever again. And now this.

Couldn’t he just catch a fucking break?

* * *

“Where are we going?” Dick asked and leaned against the door of one of Bruce’s ridiculous foreign import cars. He didn’t know why he’d expected something subtle from the man who spent his nights dressed as a giant bat. 

“Just trust me,” Bruce responded, and Dick rolled his eyes. God, it was like he was a teenager again. Would Bruce ever even see him as an adult capable of making his own decisions? So he made mistakes. So he’d made a giant one when he’d pushed himself too hard. But he’d learned from it.

He frowned when Bruce pulled into a parking space, and glanced at the sign in front of the building. “Animal shelter?”

“You need to do something nice for Damian,” Bruce responded and got out of the car before opening Dick’s door and helping him out as well. Dick glared, but got out of the car all the same. Do something nice for Damian? If memory served, Damian had been the one to ruin Dick’s life, not the other way around.

No.

It wasn’t Damian’s fault. He needed to remind himself of that. God, he never should have agreed to let the kid drive. He followed Bruce inside, his grip on his walker hard enough to turn his knuckles white. Maybe Bruce was right. Dick hadn’t been the nicest person lately. Had he said something? It wouldn’t shock him.

It was a tiny cat, really couldn't have been more than eight pounds.

It was a tiny black cat with bright blue eyes, and Dick loved it the minute he saw it. And to think, he’d always thought himself to be more of a dog person.

Damian’s eyes had lit up the second he’d come home from school. And the cat had latched onto him as if he were a magnet pulling it to him. “Where did she come from?” he asked as he scooped down to pick her up. God, Dick hadn’t seen him that excited about something in ages.

“Rescued her today,” he answered, and couldn’t keep from smiling when he saw just how happy his brother was.  _ You need to do something nice for Damian,  _ Bruce had said. But had it been for Damian to feel good or for Dick to feel good about making someone happy?

“She is perfect,” Damian decided.

“You need to name her,” Dick commented and watched Damian sit down and pet the cat, who had curled up on his lap purring contently.

“Luci,” Damian answered without missing a beat. It was amazing how much of a knack the kid had on animals. How much of a knack he’d always had with it. “Such a good girl.”

And when the cat had curled up to him that night, Dick couldn’t help but to agree.

* * *

“Well, he wasn’t wrong,” Jason commented from where he was sitting on the living room floor, back against the couch. Dick laughed and rolled his eyes, stretching out further on the cushions. “This is probably the worst movie I have ever seen.”

It had been a long afternoon to say the least. His knee was killing him, and his hip wasn’t doing much better, and he needed a distraction from worrying about what he was going to do for a living now that any of the options he wanted to do were out… And, well. Roy had given him terrible movies. And legally dead Jason Todd didn’t exactly have a day job.

“I can’t believe this was popular enough to make five movies. I can’t believe they went to fucking space.” Dick couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen Jason that happy. He couldn’t see his face, but he didn’t doubt there was a smile there. Or at least the closest thing to a smile that Jason could muster. God, he was practically bouncing up and down.

“Sixth one’s supposed to come out soon,” Dick commented. Sharks. In a tornado. God, that was hours of his life he was never going to get back. He made a mental note to find something equally bad to coerce Roy into watching.

“I am so never letting him live this down,” Jason laughed, a soft, genuine chuckle, not the forced laugh he had whenever one of their friends said something stupid. “God, he even has them on DVD.”

“To be fair, he did say they were terrible,” Dick defended and watched Jason shake his head. “But you’re right. We can’t let this go.”

And Dick laughed for the first time in what felt like forever. And he laughed until his stomach hurt. And for one fleeting second, he thought that he could be happy again.  _ Not when you can’t do anything you love doing,  _ the dark voice in his mind had said.

Still. He had been happy once. Blissfully, drunkenly happy.

And no one could ever take that away from him.

 


	6. Papa, Can You Hear Me?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trigger Warning for Suicidal Thoughts

**"The trees are so much taller, and I feel so much smaller. The moon is twice as lonely, and the stars are half as bright."**

It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair at all. He couldn't even watch the damn monitors. Couldn't Bruce at least put him to work doing something other than sitting there feeling sorry for himself? He could at least keep an eye on them, make sure they were okay. Anything was better than sitting there helpless while the others went out and risked their lives.

He'd thought about asking Jason for a comm link for the rest of the Outlaws. Not fair to them had been the thought to talk him out of it. There were things the Outlaws did that he was better off not knowing about. And why would Jason want Dick to know? They may have made progress, but Dick was still Bruce's little spy, and Dick knew deep in his gut that Jason would always see him that way.

At least they'd finally done his last surgery. It had been a doozy, and the pain afterward had been unreal. But at least they had given him more meds that made his head even fuzzier than the last ones had. Anything to make his mind be quiet for once. Maybe he should go back to the psychiatrist. Maybe he really should go on proper meds... No, that was ridiculous. He was fine. He didn't need them.

He wasn't crazy.

It was four AM when Damian came in through the door, Bruce not far behind him. "You should be asleep," Bruce had told him, and Dick had rolled his eyes. What good would trying to sleep do? He'd just toss and turn all night until he knew for sure that they were okay.

"How'd it go?" he asked, trying to keep the edge out of his voice. What was the point? It wouldn't solve anything. Him snapping at Bruce and Damian wouldn't make him any better. God, though, everything would be so much simpler if it could.

"Fine," Bruce answered, and Dick could have sworn he saw Damian roll his eyes in response. God, when had he developed such an attitude. "No Arkhkam breakouts. Just muggings, domestic disturbances..."

"You don't have to lie to me, you know," Dick had glared before going off to his room, not even bothering to listen to Damian asking him to stay.

* * *

It was days before Bruce finally let him back into the Batcave, under the understanding that he was to use none of the training equipment and not to look up any active cases on the Batcomputer. Didn't want to risk Dick thinking he needed to get involved. Like hell he wouldn't break the rules.

Still, the familiarity was nice, and he was grateful for it.

He headed down with assistance from Damian (damn those stairs, they weren't made for his crutches, that was for damned sure), and frowned when he saw Jason sitting at the computer. What the hell had gone on for Jason to risk a confrontation with Bruce? Last Dick had heard they were fighting again over God-only-knew what. "Hey," he greeted.

Jason tensed, and Dick wished he would have announced himself before saying anything. He watched Jason spin around in his chair, expression of shock changing to relief. Why was he so worried? Bruce hadn't taken his access away. He'd limited it, sure, but Jason still had more access than Dick did. At least, Dick assumed as much. "Hey," the younger man responded before spinning back around.

"What're you looking at?" Dick asked and pulled up a chair next to Jason, trying to focus on the screen. God, it had been so long since he'd seen any of Bruce's equipment or cases. But this was definitely a Jason thing.

"Nothing," he answered and closed out of the window, and God, Dick wanted to scream. Jason seriously wanted to play that game too? He wasn't some fragile piece of glass that needed to be protected. At least seeing what was going on would give him an idea of how much he should worry or not worry while the others were on patrol.

"You doing okay?" Dick asked, and Jason just shook his head. He thought about pressing. It wasn't really worth it, though. Pressing just made Jason shut down even more. He didn't want to risk losing the progress they'd made. "Anything I can do?" he asked instead, and watched as Jason just shook his head again.

Dick rolled his eyes and pulled his chair closer to the desk, folding his arms on top of the surface and resting his head on top of them. Might as well make himself comfortable. God knew Jason’s moods could last what felt like an eternity. “Can I help you?” Jason cocked an eyebrow and turned to face him. Dick just shrugged in reply. 

Could either of them ever really be helped like they needed to be?

Sometimes he doubted the hell out of that.

* * *

“So you finished the Sharknado movies,” Roy waltzed into the living room and draped himself across the couch, swinging his legs up over Dick’s. Dick shot him a glare, but couldn’t hold it before a smile formed on his lips and a chuckle escaped his throat. “Did I not tell you they were the worst things you’d seen in your life?”

“Oh, you definitely warned me,” he laughed and leaned his back against the armrest, carefully turning to face his friend. “You owe me big time for that,” he added even if he didn’t mean it. Roy was a good guy, had gotten a hell of a lot better since kicking the drug habit, and Dick would have severely maimed anyone that tried to go after the redhead, especially after Roy had been so nice to him during everything.

“Believe it or not, I brought you worse,” Roy held up another DVD. Arachnoquake? Seriously? Where the hell was he even finding all of these. “Ollie sat and watched this one with me when I lost my arm. And let me tell you. Sharknado has nothing on it.”

“Do they go to space?”

“Unfortunately no.”

“I heard terrible movies,” Dick tilted his head back to get a clear view of the doorway and felt his smile broaden when he saw Jason leaning against the frame. God, Dick was glad to see him out of the Batcave. He wondered if Jason had even slept the night before. Based on the dark circles under his eyes and paleness to his skin, Dick doubted it. Dick watched Jason’s eyes dart between him and Roy. If he didn’t know any better, he could have sworn he saw a slight frown on the younger man’s face, even if it was only there for a fraction of a second.

“Come on, Jaybird,” Roy shifted so his legs were on the coffee table instead. Alfred would kill him if he saw, but Dick wasn’t going to say anything about it. It had been a long time, too long, since the three of them had been in the same room together. “More the merrier.”

Dick watched Jason roll his eyes before moving and sitting between them, slightly leaning closer to Dick. “It can’t be worse than the last five we saw,” Dick commented.

God, he had never been more wrong.

* * *

It was amazing how the little things could send him spiraling back down into waves of depression and self-loathing that he didn’t ask for and didn’t want. He’d come down to the living room. Damian had been sitting on the floor, Luci and Alred in his lap, watching the television.

Men’s gymnastics.

He stood and stared at the screen.

High bar.

He watched the man flip and fly like it was easy, like he was meant to be in the air, and God Dick knew the feeling.

He was meant to be in the air, not stuck on the ground. His parents had been airborne all their lives. He should have lived and died that way, not be stuck broken and damaged for the rest of his life. “Grayson?” Damian turned to face him, and Dick shook his head and left the room.

It wasn’t right.

It wasn’t fair.

Hadn’t enough of his parents been taken away from him already? Why the hell did the universe have to sever the one connection he still had with them? “Dick?” Bruce frowned, and fuck why was Bruce even there? He should have been at work for Christ’s sake. “What’s going on?”

“Just leave me alone,” Dick tried to leave, but Bruce stood and blocked his way, and dammit why couldn’t anyone just leave him alone? He didn’t want to force his issues onto them. And every damn time Damian saw him, Dick knew he felt guiltier than before, and Bruce had always had a knack for making things hundreds of times worse than they needed to be.

“Dick, what’s going on?”

“I wish I would have fallen with them,” he blurted out because it was so much easier than trying to hold it in, and God, he should have just gone with them instead of being stuck in his own personal hell. He tried to move past Bruce again, but Bruce just blocked him again, and God, Bruce could just go to hell and stay there because Dick just wanted to be alone with his thoughts and memories and knowledge that he was never going to see them again and never going to even feel like everything was normal again…

“You don’t mean that,” Bruce shook his head, but what the fuck did Bruce know anyway? 

“I just don’t want to be like this anymore,” his voice broke, and he knew it was true.

His stupid knee and his stupid hip had cost him everything near and dear from him.

So what was the fucking point in going on anymore?


	7. I Don't Care Much

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is a mentioned suicide attempt in this chapter.

**“So if you kiss me, if we touch, warning’s fair. I don’t care very much.”**

He lay in his bed, staring up at the ceiling. When had he ended up back there? He didn't remember. Somewhere between damn near collapsing on Bruce and taking the meds he'd reluctantly let the psychiatrist prescribe him. His sleep had been dreamless, and his body felt heavy, and his mind was fuzzy and he hated it.

He couldn't even sleep right.

A body moved next to him, and he frowned, trying to figure out who it was and why they were there. Damian lay next to him, curled up in a ball on his side, whimpering in his sleep. God, sometimes it was so easy to forget that Damian had been in that damned car too. That he'd been the one driving it.

And for a minute, he wasn't in the manor with its warm lights and hardwood floors and calming colors, but rather caught between pieces of smashed metal, bright headlights blaring into his eyes, his skull and hip and knee hurting. Everywhere hurting, really.

He shook his head trying to clear it before gently shaking Damian's shoulders, rolling his eyes when the teen groaned in response. Typical teen, even if the kid didn't want to admit it. "Wake up, Dami," he yawned, trying to fight through the foggy mess his head had become. God, what had they given him?

Damian groaned again before his eyes shot open, glancing around the room with a panicked expression glued on his face. Dick watched panic turn to realization, and watched the panicked expression fade back into typical neutrality. "Grayson," he said, voice still groggy with sleep. "When did I end up here?"

"Not sure, Little D," Dick shook his head and shrugged. "Was kinda knocked out myself."

Damian nodded and moved off the bed, no doubt trying to act like he hadn't been having another nightmare. Like he hadn't ended up in Dick's room seeking some form of protection, maybe even comfort. "I am late for school," he declared, and Dick sighed deeply and watched him leave without another word.

* * *

Jason sat next to him, and Dick lay curled up against his side. Physical therapy had been hellish that day. When wasn't it? But this time left him hurting more than usual. His muscles were screaming from strain they hadn't seen in weeks, and he just wanted to crawl up in bed and sleep everything away. Maybe even just sleep his life away.

It would all be so much easier if he could just sleep everything off.

"I swear to God, there is nothing on TV in the middle of the day," Jason commented as he flicked through the channels, and Dick just nodded because damned if he didn't already know that. There was no point in conversing over a truth he already knew. Why fucking bother? "You okay?" Jason frowned and turned to face him. "You're not nearly as chatty as you usually are."

"Fine," Dick muttered even though it was the furthest thing from the truth. His meltdown the day before had terrified Bruce. Why wouldn't it? He was lucky Bruce let him be alone even for a few seconds. And he wasn't an idiot. He knew Jason was there to babysit him. Why would anyone want to spend time with a mopey former superhero who needed help walking down a damned hallway?

But Jason had been there every step of the way. And God, he was lonely, and Jason was there, and...

His head was moving before he knew what he was doing. And he smashed his lips against Jason's and wrapped his arms around his waist, pulling him closer, and something in the back of his mind was telling him to stop because it wasn't right, and he was using Jason to feel  _ something.  _ To feel anything.

Even if that something would end up being crippling regret later down the road. And he felt Jason start to pull away, and he pulled him closer and he didn't care because it felt good, or at least it felt good right then and right there.

And Jason eventually relaxed, and Dick pulled away and tried to ignore the way Jason shuffled away from him, tried to ignore the set jaw and clenched teeth, the way he was trying to act like nothing had ever happened.

It was a mistake. He wanted to apologize. But he kept his mouth shut. He would apologize. Jason would say it was fine even when it wasn't. They'd go on pretending everything was okay between the two of them. Rinse and repeat.

This wasn't how any of this was supposed to happen, and he hated himself for it.

Lately it felt like all he could do was hate himself.

* * *

Bruce had sent Dick to pick Damian up from school, and it had taken all of his energy to get into that damned car. Weeks after the accident, and his palms still got sweaty, and he still felt sick to his stomach at the thought of being in control of something that had nearly killed him.  _ Pull it together, Grayson,  _ he told himself and loosened the death-grip he had on the wheel. It was just a hunk of metal. It couldn't do anything without someone in charge.

What had his sergeant _... former  _ sergeant, he had to remind himself, always said to him?  _ Never put that the vehicle did something in a report, Grayson. The vehicle can't do shit without a driver. _

He pulled into a parking space and rolled the windows down, keeping an eye on the Gotham Academy entrance. He glanced at the time on the clock. 3:01. Damian would be out any minute. "Grayson," Dick jumped when he heard Damian's voice coming from the driver side window. "I... May I drive home?"

Dick frowned at that. Last he had heard, Damian was avoiding driving as much as he possibly could. It had been an act of congress for the teen to agree to drive with Bruce in the passenger seat. And he sure as hell hadn't asked Dick for help learning since the accident. “I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he answered carefully and watched as Damian sighed and slid into the passenger seat, throwing his backpack into the backseat.

“Grayson,” he began, and Dick had to resist the urge to roll his eyes. “I am more than capable of…”

“Of what?” Dick snapped, not knowing where it came from, not really caring where it came from. “Wrapping the car around a fucking truck in the middle of the God-damned night? ‘Cause that’s what happened last time, Damian, and I’m sure as fuck not repeating that.”

“Grayson…”

“No, Dami,” Dick shook his head and threw the car into reverse. “Last time you drove you ruined my life. I’m not letting you fuck it up more.”

“I’m sorry,” Damian whimpered and turned away from Dick.

And if Dick hadn’t known any better, he would have sworn the kid was crying.

* * *

“Dick, wake the fuck up,” someone was shaking his shoulder. He groaned and glanced at his alarm on the side of the bed. Who the hell was in his room at three AM? He groaned and blinked, frowning when he saw Jason, arms crossed across his chest, looking more pissed off than Dick had seen him in a long time. Great. They were finally going to  _ talk about it.  _ At three in the morning… “What the fuck did you do?”

“I’m sorry,” Dick muttered. “It was stupid. I shouldn’t have kissed you and…”

 “You think I’m here at three in the god-damned morning about  _ that _ ?” Jason demanded, and Dick felt a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach because something was wrong. Something was horribly, horribly wrong. “Damian’s in a fucking ambulance right now.”

“What?” Dick felt his blood run cold as he shot up, kicking the blankets off of him as he did. Damian was in an ambulance? Why? Dick needed to get to the hospital and find out, because God knew Bruce wasn’t going to do the kid any good… “What the hell happened? Where’s Bruce? Why are you here?”

“Bruce rode with him,” Jason responded, voice cold and even in a way he’d never used with Dick before. “Slit his fucking arm open. Kept muttering that it was his fault. Did you say something to him, Dick? Because I swear to God…”

“Why the fuck do you care?” Dick demanded, voice harsher than he intended it to be. God, it was so much easier to be angry than worried or scared. “You hate him.”

“Yeah, well I have a special place for cripples and bastards and broken things,” Jason responded, and  _ God  _ it was just like him to say something nerdy in a dire situation, and God, Dick needed to get to the hospital because this was his fault. He never should have snapped. He should have… 

“We need to get there,” Dick threw on a pair of sweats and a t-shirt before struggling with his shoes. Weeks of PT and he still couldn’t bend his damned left knee right.

“Okay,” Jason sighed and ran a hand through his hair. “I’ll drive.

Dick nodded and moved as fast as he could, hoping to God that Damian would be okay.


	8. Nothing

**"They all felt something, but I felt nothing, except the feeling that this bullshit was absurd."**

The ride to the hospital had started out silently enough. Jason sat behind the wheel, teeth gritted, posture rigid. Dick tried to keep himself from losing his own mind. He couldn't believe it. Damian had seemed fine... Okay, maybe not completely  _ fine,  _ but Dick never thought, never would have dreamed that...

"Did you say something to him?" Jason asked, breaking the silence that Dick had once found refuge in. Why did Jason have to want to talk about it?

"Oh, this is my fault?" Dick questioned, voice more sharp than he intended it to be. They were still a good three miles out of the hospital. It wasn't the time to pick a fight, not when Jason seemed more on-edge than he usually did.

"I didn't say that," Jason responded, keeping his eyes on the road. "But we've all been walking on eggshells around you. Anything could have set him off."

"You're all walking on eggshells around me?" Dick repeated. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"I mean that we're all watching what we say or how we act around you because none of us know you're gonna react anymore." Dick felt like he'd been slapped. He knew everyone had seemed at least a little bit off since the accident, but he had figured it was just because they were giving him some space. "You've been testy since the surgery, and I get it, okay? You're upset. You don't know what's going to happen next. But you don't get to go around and take it out on all of us."

Dick shut his eyes tightly.

Jason was right, and he hated it when Jason was right.

"I'm not saying this was your fault because it wasn't," Jason sighed, and Dick opened his eyes again to see Jason's shoulders even more tense than they'd been a minute ago. "But it's time to pull your head out of your ass, Goldie. You ain't the only person in the world who's hurting. Get over yourself."

The remainder of the ride had been silent, painfully silent. Had he not been injured, Dick figured Jason would have told him to get out and walk the rest of the way. “I’m sorry,” he said after a long moment. “About yesterday… That was. It was stupid.”

“It’s whatever,” Jason sighed, and Dick couldn’t help but think the younger man looked so much older than he was. Granted, Jason had never really looked young, not even when he was a kid, just starting out as Robin. “You’re just… You’re pretty fucked up right now. It’s fine.”

But Dick couldn’t help but think that they were far from fine, and that they always would be.

* * *

Damian looked so small with his wrists bandaged, attached to leads and monitors. "Grayson," the boy greeted weakly, and Dick hesitated to move from the doorway of the room to the chair by the bed. Bruce had reluctantly left to give them some space to talk. Tim hadn't wanted Dick to visit at all.

It had been an ugly wait in the ER waiting room. No one had told them anything until Damian had woken up, even after Bruce had all baut threatened the triage nurse. And Dick had been forced to wait even longer while the others went back to see Damian, make sure he was stable for themselves.

The waiting had damn near killed him, and Dick wanted to apologize to every last member of his family for putting them through this after the wreck, for making them worry every time he wished he had died in the wreck instead of lived in his own personal hell.

"How are you feeling?" Dick asked, and tried to ignore the sounds of the nurses and doctors fluttering about the wing.  _ Admit him. Psych ward. Involuntary hold...  _ It was a stupid question. Damian had just tried to die by his own hand. Of course he wasn't feeling well.

He wished he couldn't relate.

"I woke up," Damian glared, and Dick flinched slightly. He deserved that. He deserved every terrible, awful thing that the universe could throw at him.  _ It's not your fault,  _ everyone kept telling him. Still, he wondered how many of them actually believed that. How much of this could have been avoided if Dick had just been a little bit nicer to Damian? If he hadn't yelled at him?

How was he so worried about his own issues that he didn't see the signs glaring right at him in the first place.

_ You weren't the only one in that wreck,  _ he could hear Jason's voice echoing in his head, could see his disappointed expression.

There was nothing worse than disappointing the people he cared about.

"You scared the hell out of me," Dick said, and immediately wished he would have said something else, anything else. This wasn't about him. Jason had made that clear as day. "I'm glad you're okay."

"Yeah, well I am not," Damian muttered and turned onto his side, facing away from Dick. "I think you should go.

It stung, knowing Damian didn't want him there, knowing Damian wanted him anywhere  _ but  _ there. Once upon a time they had been inseparable, glued at the hip. And now there was a void between them that he wasn't sure he'd ever be able to cross. Hard to put a band-aid on a wound that needed stitches.

"I'm sorry I yelled at you," Dick sighed before turning on his heel and leaving the room.  _ He's going to be okay,  _ he tried to tell himself. Because Damian had to be okay. Their family had been hurt enough.

He didn't think he could handle any more.

* * *

"How'd it go?" Jason asked once the two were finally alone again. Bruce had gone to talk with Damian's doctors about an involuntary hold. Tim had gone home to study for a test he had the next day.

But Jason was seriously asking how it went? How the hell did he think it had gone? That Dick and Damian had held hands and sung "Kumbaya"?

"How did he look?" Jason pressed, and Dick just sighed and sat down. Couldn't Jason see that this was the absolute last thing he wanted to talk about? He didn't even want to think about it. Damian was only sixteen. He should have been worried about school and dating. He didn't deserve to have the kind of guilt he had hanging around him all the time.

The car crash wasn't his fault. And it had been a low blow to imply that it had been. Dick knew that. And he would have taken it back a thousand times over if he could have. "How the hell do you think he looked, Jason?" he questioned, looking up and making eye contact with the younger man. "You could've gone back and seen him."

"I think it's already pressing it enough with B that I'm here in the first place," Jason sighed and plopped down beside Dick.

Dick nodded and ran a hand through his hair. A sick part of him was glad Jason was stuck in the waiting room with him. At least then he had someone to keep him company. "Look, you don't have to stay. I can ride home with B."

"Oh no," Jason shook his head. "I'm invested now."

Dick nodded and stared up at the ceiling, counting the tiles. Sometimes he wondered who got paid to design hospital waiting rooms, who picked the drop ceilings and harsh fluorescent lighting.

Sometimes he thought the only place more depressing than an ER waiting room was an ICU waiting room. He wished he hadn't had adequate experience in either of them. "This was all my fault," he shut his eyes again, even if Jason had told him it wasn't. Even if everyone on the face of the damn planet had told him it wasn't.

"You need help, Goldie," Jason sighed, and Dick tried not to think of the prescription for the anti-depressants that he'd ripped up so many weeks ago.

He was beginning to wish he'd never done that.

Because he couldn't keep doing this. He couldn't do this on his own, not anymore.

He took a deep, shaky breath before opening his eyes again, glancing over at Jason.

"I think you're right."


End file.
